Fat

THE BIBLOPEDIA

Easton’s Bible Dictionary (1897) · International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915)

THE DICTIONARY — Easton’s Bible Dictionary (1897)

(Hebrews heleb) denotes the richest part of the animal, or the fattest of the flock, in the account of Abel’s sacrifice (Genesis 4:4). It sometimes denotes the best of any production (Genesis 45:18; Numbers 18:12; Psalm 81:16; 147:47). The fat of sacrifices was to be burned (Leviticus 3:9-11; 4:8; 7:3; 8:25; Numbers 18:17. Comp. Exodus 29:13-22; Leviticus 3:3-5). It is used figuratively for a dull, stupid state of mind (Ps 17:10). In Joel 2:24 the word is equivalent to “vat,” a vessel. The hebrew word here thus rendered is elsewhere rendered “wine-fat” and “press-fat” (Hag. 2:16; Isaiah 63:2).

THE FULL ARTICLE — from the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915), general editor James Orr — public domain, printed whole.

(chelebh, chelebh): The layer of subcutaneous fat and the compact suet surrounding the viscera and imbedded in the entrails, which, like the blood, was forbidden as food in the Mosaic code (Le 3:17). It was to be sacrificed to God by being burnt upon the altar (Le 3:16; 30). This had to be done on the very day on which a beast had been slaughtered, to remove temptation from the Israelite to use it otherwise (Ex 23:18). The law was probably a sanitary restriction, for, at an early date, leprosy, scrofula and disfiguring cutaneous diseases were thought to be caused by the use of fat as food. It was, moreover, an important pedagogical provision teaching the idea of self-denial, and the maxim that the richest and best meat of the edible animal belonged to Yahweh.